Dear Students,

I am looking forward to meeting all of you on December 6th (next week today) for the first
lecture of OPSM 501 Operations Management.

The catalog description of this course is as follows: Fundamental decisions and trade-
offs in the operations management of service as well as manufacturing companies:
obtaining and controlling productive resources; process management fundamentals;
cross-functional integration, coordination, and control; improving the performance of
productive systems; and competing through technology and operations.

Operations management may be defined as the design, operation, and improvement of

the production systems that create value for customers through the firm’s primary
products and services. Innovation is defined as the transformation of an idea into a new
or improved product or service introduced on the market or a new or improved
operational process used in industry and commerce or into a new approach to a social
service. Following this definition, we will discuss operations management as a way of
implementing process innovation.

You can find the syllabus attached: opsm501F19.pdf

I will support all of you to make it sure that you complete the course with a thorough
understanding of operations management. In order to attain this level of understanding,
you should also invest with your time. Each 3-credit course requires 2 additional hours
outside the classroom for each lecture hour.

You will be using three sources as the main material:

1. Textbook:

* Cachon, G. and Terwiesch, C., Matching Supply with Demand: An Introduction to

Operations Management, 2nd edition, McGrawHill

* Goldratt, E.M. and J. Cox, The Goal, North River Press

This is a required novel (you can start reading the book now . You should finish the book
by January 6th, 2016 before the Littlefield Simulation starts)
2. Articles and Cases
You can access from the Blackboard page of the course

3. Lecture Notes
I will share all the slides, excel files etc. after each lecture.

I will be using Blackboard Learning Management system to share all the information with
you during the semester. As a registered student to this course, you should have access
to this course when you login with your KU username and password. (http://
ku.blackboard.com/). You can check the page now.

Since we will meet three times for three days each time for this course, you should use
the time effectively and come prepared to the class.

For the first lecture, I expect you to read Chapters 1, 2, 3 from the textbook and also the
readings B1, and B2 (available in Blackboard). You should also read the Turkish Airlines
case for the second lecture. The first case study we will discuss will be Fasten:
Challenging Uber and Lyft with a New Business Model on December 8th. You will submit an
analysis of this case as a group. You can download the case from the Blackboard system
to get prepared.

You will be using three simulations during the course: Process Analytics, Inventory
Management, and Global Supply Chain Management. I will give you more information
about these simulations later.

The teaching assistant for this course is Burak Çelik (bcleik18@ku.edu.tr).

Looking forward to meeting you on December 7th. Note that we will start promptly at
9:00.

Best regards,

Barış Tan

----

Barış Tan
Professor of Operations Management
Vice President for Academic Affairs
Koç University
http://home.ku.edu.tr/~btan